Well he was born on December 16, 1770 and would be a good candidate for us "Good Newsers" to remember. We often find good news in the midst of tragedy, people overcoming terrible circumstances to rediscover the joy of life and Beethoven suffered terrible tinnitus (something that I am an expert at, unfortunately) which creates sounds in the ear sometimes called "ringing in the ear" but would be better understood as "train whistle in the ear" making it impossible to hear his own music and driving him to consider suicide:

Around 1796, by the age of 26, Beethoven began to lose his hearing. He suffered from a severe form of tinnitus, a "ringing" in his ears that made it hard for him to hear music; he also tried to avoid conversations. The cause of Beethoven's deafness is unknown, but it has variously been attributed to typhus, auto-immune disorders (such as systemic lupus erythematosus), and even his habit of immersing his head in cold water to stay awake. The explanation from Beethoven's autopsy was that he had a "distended inner ear," which developed lesions over time.

As early as 1801, Beethoven wrote to friends describing his symptoms and the difficulties they caused in both professional and social settings (although it is likely some of his close friends were already aware of the problems). Beethoven, on the advice of his doctor, lived in the small Austrian town of Heiligenstadt, just outside Vienna, from April to October 1802 in an attempt to come to terms with his condition. There he wrote his Heiligenstadt Testament, a letter to his brothers which records his thoughts of suicide due to his growing deafness and records his resolution to continue living for and through his art.Over time, his hearing loss became profound: there is a well-attested story that, at the end of the premiere of his Ninth Symphony, he had to be turned around to see the tumultuous applause of the audience; hearing nothing, he wept

Beethoven would be an apt poster child for those of us who struggle against tedium, banality, pain and angst to find the joy of the day because he fought back from all of that to create music that still grabs your emotions today.

But no silly rabbit today we celebrate the birth of my oldest daughter whose middle name is Hataichanok which in Thai is translated as "heart of the father". I always look up Beethoven's birthday at the beginning of December to make sure I don't muff the day.

This is a wonderful book for parents to read to young children. It tells the true story of elephants trained to make paintings. "I teach in two schools," Katya Arnold writes. "One is in the city. The other is in the jungle. Some of my students have hands. Others have trunks."

. . .

Many of the elephants make aimless drawings, but it seemed to me that a few are creating real patterns. Not only that - an elephant named Gongkam had painted highly realistic pictures of various flowers; one bunch with long stems looked like irises. Another elephant, Larnkam, had made both flowers and swirling abstract designs; several looked a bit like intertwined double helixes. These were in contrast to the art I saw on a couple of other Web sites, done by elephants in zoos, where almost all the work looked like scribbling. It is interesting that the best elephant artists seem to be young, only 4 or 5 years old; it's likely that many zoo animals are much older and it may be more difficult for them to learn.

THE JEB BUSH BOOMLET — New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie gets all the love as the current GOP front-runner for 2016 (to the extent there can even be a front runner three years out.) But there is growing chatter in elite New York financial circles that former Florida Governor Jeb Bush is giving more serious consideration to getting in the race, especially if it appears at any point that Christie is not drawing big national appeal beyond the northeast. Several plugged in GOP sources said Bush has moved from almost certainly staying out to a 30 percent chance of getting in. The “70/30” odds pop up in so many conversations they almost seem like circulated talking points.

“I think he could run,” said one senior Republican who now works in the financial industry. “The environment is shaping up well for him. Republicans want someone who is competent and who can win and that’s Jeb.” Of course it could also be Christie. Some of the chatter ratcheted up because Bush was in NYC on Tuesday and spoke at the SIFMA conference and took some hard shots at President Obama for taking “victory dances” after fiscal fights and not building relationships with Republicans that could help on tax reform, immigration and other issues. Bush also slammed Obamacare saying it would collapse of its own weight and the GOP should be “ready with an alternative.”

Bush billed his remarks and his conversation with CNBC’s Becky Quick as “non-partisan” but he sure seemed to lay out a center-right campaign vision (education reform, immigration reform, tax reform to boost GDP) while also taking harder partisan jabs. It seemed to many in the Wall Street crowd like Bush was gearing up for a run. And people who know the governor say that if he does decide to run he will drop everything else he is doing (working for Barclays, among things) and go all in. Lots of questions remain (including how he deals with fellow Floridian Marco Rubio’s ambitions; what about Bush fatigue etc.) but don’t count out a Bush bid just yet.

The fundamental difference in the sociology of the two parties is that the Democrats consist of various groups that have high overlapping areas of interests: minorities, anti-war, woman's rights, economic justice, sexual orientation civil rights. There really is no antagonism between the group and virtually every Democrat sees themselves as being a part of several groups.

Republicans are a collection of fundamentally antagonistic groups: defense hawks, corporate establishment, evangelical, pro life, tea bag, racist, John Birch, and they really don't like each other. The fact that it was so close in VA will give the TeaParty hope, they just need to 'tweak' their message, not overhaul it.

They are now polarized into the Cruz vs Christie factions. Both will be able to mobilize money and people. There is no real room for compromise and they will battle it to the end.

The reality is that Republicans must take Ohio, Florida, North Carolina and Virginia to get close to the electoral college. Cruz can't do it. Christie can't even deliver NJ. The Republican who has the best chance with those states will be Jeb Bush.

Over the next 3 years Christie and Cruz will be involved in inter party and partisan fights that will leave them both bloodied and diminished. Jeb Bush can remain quiet on the sidelines and float above it all and in 2015 enter the primaries a fresh face that unifies a bloodied party and reaches out to Hispanics.

PPP’s newest Kentucky poll finds voters in the state extremely unhappy about the government shutdown, and taking it out on Mitch McConnell. The Republican Senator Minority Leader now trails Alison Lundergan Grimes 45/43 for reelection.

60% of Kentucky voters opposed the shutdown, compared to only 32% who supported it. Those numbers are in line with what we’ve found in other red states- it doesn’t matter if a place went for Obama by 20 points or Romney by 20 points last fall, the shutdown is a huge problem for Republican politicians everywhere.

48% of voters in the state say they’re less likely to support McConnell for reelection next year because he supported the shutdown, compared to only 34% who say they’re now more likely to support him.

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell says he will not allow another government shutdown as part of a strategy to repeal ObamaCare.

McConnell (Ky.) told The Hill in an interview Thursday afternoon that his party learned a painful political lesson over the past 16 days, as its approval rating dropped while the government was shuttered.

He said there’s no reason to go through the political wringer again in January, when the stopgap Congress passed late Wednesday expires.

“One of my favorite old Kentucky sayings is there’s no education in the second kick of a mule. The first kick of a mule was when we shut the government down in the mid 1990s and the second kick was over the last 16 days,” he said. “There is no education in the second kick of a mule. There will not be a government shutdown.

“I think we have fully now acquainted our new members with what a losing strategy that is,” he added.

Now in an obvious and organized leak to the three main pillars of the establishment press Democratic Senators have indicated that Sunday was not only deadlocked but in fact the Democrats have gone on the offensive and want Sequestering cuts done away with.

Tomorrow is a holiday but the markets are open. Conventional thinking by the talking heads is that light trading and not much will happen. Light trading also means that if there are aggressive sellers and no buyers that the indexes will sink, and fast. even or especially in light traffic. If they think they have a day to get their profits out, it will accelerate.

It seems to me that the Democrats are willing to apply the kerosene.

This will lead to a near unanimous Senate resolution for a long term fix.

The House will have to bring it to the floor and 50 Republicans will use the cover of the markets and the Senate to pass the legislation WITHOUT AMENDMENT.

WASHINGTON—Senate leaders attempting to avoid a U.S. debt default remained at loggerheads Sunday and escalated the standoff by reopening the contentious issue of automatic spending cuts, damping hopes that some of Congress's most canny negotiators would break the impasse.

As the search for a way to end the partial federal shutdown and avoid a debt crisis shifted to the Senate, Democrats made plain that one of their top priorities was to diminish the next round of across-the-board spending cuts, known as the sequester, due to take effect early next year.

Many Republicans, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.), oppose retreating from those cuts. That set up a clash that seemed almost as intense as the one that caused budget talks between House Republicans and President Barack Obama to collapse Friday.

WASHINGTON — With a possible default on government obligations just days away, Senate Democratic leaders — believing they have a political advantage in the continuing fiscal impasse — refused Sunday to sign on to any deal that reopens the government but locks in budget cuts for next year.

The disagreement extended the stalemate that has kept much of the government shuttered for two weeks and threatens to force a federal default.

The core of the dispute is about spending, and how long a stopgap measure that would reopen the government should last. Democrats want the across-the-board cuts known as sequestration to last only through mid-November; Republicans want them to last as long as possible.

What started as a mad dash to strike a deal to lift the federal debt limit slowed to a crawl over the weekend as stalemated Senate leaders waited nervously to see whether financial markets would plunge Monday morning and drive the other side toward compromise.

Republicans seemed to think they had more to lose. After talks broke down between President Obama and House leaders, GOP senators quickly cobbled together a plan to end the government shutdown — now entering its third week — and raise the $16.7 trillion debt limit. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) then asked Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) to elevate negotiations to the highest level.

On Sunday — with the Treasury Department due to exhaust its borrowing power in just four days — Reid was wielding that leverage to maximum advantage. Rather than making concessions that would undermine Obama’s signature health-care initiative, as Republicans first demanded, Democrats are now on the offensive and seeking to undo what has become a cherished prize for the GOP: deep agency spending cuts known as the sequester.